Keeping Children Active Beyond the Digital Divide

During the pandemic, many children lost access to schools, playgrounds and regular physical education. Digital programmes helped some children stay active, but not every household had access to stable internet, devices or adult support.

To address this gap, Sportz Village Foundation, supported by DXC Technology, piloted Race Around India—an offline, non-digital physical education intervention that helped children engage in structured physical activity safely from home.

The programme was implemented across Tamil Nadu and Bangalore and was designed as a team-based race that combined movement, learning and friendly competition.

An Offline Way to Keep Children Moving

Race Around India was created to make physical activity accessible even when children could not participate in digital learning programmes.Children participated from home by completing activities such as sprinting, running, skipping, cycling, climbing stairs, spot jogging, jumping jacks and push-ups.

The programme used a simple game format where teams competed against each other by completing activities and earning points.

How the Race Worked

The pilot included five competing groups, with each group consisting of approximately 32 to 40 children.The programme ran for around 10 weeks, or approximately 2 to 2.5 months. During this period, each child completed an average of 60 activities.

The race was designed around ten city stages. Teams began their journey in Bangalore, travelled through major Indian cities and returned to Bangalore at the end of the race.

The cities included:

• Bangalore
• Chennai
• Thiruvananthapuram
• Mumbai
• Ahmedabad
• New Delhi
• Lucknow
• Guwahati
• Kolkata
• Hyderabad

Team-Based Learning and Competition

Children were divided into four teams:

• Team Green
• Team Yellow
• Team Blue
• Team Red

Each child received a workbook linked to their team colour.

The workbook included:

• City-race activity points and activity charts
• Trivia about each city’s culture, language, food, geography and history

The aim was for every team member to participate. The team that completed the race first, after all members had completed their activities, was declared the winner.

Activities Children Could Perform at Home

The programme used activities that children could perform within or around their homes and communities.

These included:

• Sprinting
• Running
• Spot jogging
• Skipping
• Climbing stairs
• Cycling
• Jumping jacks
• Push-ups
• Playing a team sport at home with friends

This format made the programme flexible, practical and accessible for children with different levels of space, equipment and support.

Outcomes of Race Around India

Full Participation

The programme recorded 100% participation among children who took part in the race.

Improved Physical Fitness

The activities were designed to help children strengthen key fitness areas:

• Lower body strength
• Upper body strength
• Flexibility
• Anaerobic capacity
• Aerobic capacity
• Abdominal strength

Social-Emotional Development

Race Around India gave children opportunities to practise important social-emotional skills.

Children learned to:

• Be team players
• Encourage teammates to participate
• Work alongside both girls and boys in the same team
• Use creativity to adapt activities using household items
• Explore new activities, including cycling, especially for girls

The programme also built in gender-sensitive practices, including appointing female witnesses for female participants.

Learning Through Play

Beyond physical activity, Race Around India introduced children to India’s geography, cultural diversity, languages and historical context through its city-based workbook.

The programme showed that learning and physical education can continue even without digital access, when activities are designed to be inclusive, engaging and easy to use at home.